The Good Men Project Magazine went live online last summer. The GMP calls itself “a gathering place for thoughtful men with a conscience.” The articles are indeed thoughtful pieces on a wide range of topics, without the anxious masculinity that pervades mainstream men’s magazines. Once Men’s Rights Advocates (MRAs) discovered it, however, the comment sections became unreadable. A piece about helping daughters grow up with positive body image? “Feminist propaganda.” A piece about education? “Feminist administrators are poisoning boys with ADHD meds.”

This week was Men’s Rights week on the site, so it’s only going to get (and probably stay) worse. The GMP published about a dozen articles about the Men’s Rights Movement and/or from MRA perspectives. The Men’s Rights Movement includes many Nice Guys® and overlaps with the PUA (pick-up artist) community and expatriate dating scene (I won’t link to American Women Suck but you can find it if you so choose). The Straight White Men’s Rights Movement would be a more accurate name for their movement, as they never acknowledge gay men’s rights or issues faced by men of color.

MRAs reject the very notion that “men oppressed women.” It didn’t happen. Ever.
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Feminism is little more than government-sponsored and -enforced chivalry.
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Men are literally saying “screw you” to women as a sex, and society in general, and for the first time ever, are dismantling the Chivalric infrastructure.

MRAs claim the myth that women dislike sex was begun by feminists in order to make men devote more energy to pleasing them. They claim women rape men as often–if not more–as men rape women, and complain that the justice system is too kind to female domestic violence and rape victims (ahem, accusers). They are very upset that women are awarded custody of their children after a divorce more often than men are, but they balk at the suggestion that men take on the primary care-giving role in their families. “Feminist social engineering.”

The wage gap is a myth, of course, and they are sick and tired of working long hours in grueling jobs just to make women happy. MRAs direct a lot of anger at women who have been abused–even killed–by intimate partners. What was she doing with an asshole like him in the first place when she could have been with a asshole Nice Guy® like me?

Amanda Marcotte contributed a post called, “The Solution to MRA Problems? More Feminism.” And she’s right: if MRAs were motivated by anything besides misogyny, it would make perfect sense for them to get on board with feminism. But they hate feminists and do not believe patriarchy exists. They talk about “male reproductive rights,” but: they just don’t want to pay child support. They think we live in a “gynocracy.” It’s impossible to have a discussion with one of them because they live in an alternate reality.

The funny and feminist David Futrelle mocks MRAs on his blog Man Boobz. In his piece for GMP, he wrote:

To borrow a phrase from computer programmers: misogyny isn’t a bug in the Men’s Rights Movement; it’s a feature.
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MRAs … are quick to raise the issue prison rape (which mostly affects men) whenever rape is being discussed, but generally only to score rhetorical points; very few MRAs seem to even be aware there is an established national organization, Just Detention, devoted to fighting prison rape.
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At its heart, men’s rights activism doesn’t really seem to be about activism at all. What the movement has turned into is a strange parody of “victim feminism,” an endless search for proof that men (despite earning more than women, heading up the overwhelming majority of companies and governments in the world, getting all the best movie roles, never having to wear heels, and so on and so on and so on) are in fact second-class citizens.

MRAs really hate him, and call him–and any other man who likes women–a “mangina” and a traitor. But he soldiers on, uncovering the vilest of the vile in the MRA blogosphere. To be honest, MRAs scare the shit out of me. They are proud of their misogyny. My time spent on the Internet makes me think they are multiplying like rabbits. The community will create another George Sodini; it’s just a matter of when.

23 Responses to “Men’s Rights and PUAs and Nice Guys®, Oh My!”

I share your concern. They are every bit as scary as the white supremacy movement and other groups devoted to the irrational hatred of segments of the population.
The fact that so few people see them as a threat is a sad statement about how entrenched misogyny is in our culture.

I am very familiar with these sociopaths. When I blog about rape or victim advocacy under my blog Polimicks, invariably “FalseRapeGuy” (his lj name) shows up to tell me the DOJ is part of a Feminist Conspiracy to imprison and enslave men, blah, blah, tinfoil hat, blah…

I tried reasoning with him at first, but quickly gave that up as bad business.

I think the site (Good Men Project) is worthwhile and read it all the time, but I won’t touch the comments, especially now that the MRA subject came up. To me the MRAs have a few valid points (about pressures on boys for instance)but they ruin it by their style. GMP should moderate comments perhaps, wonder why they dont.

I read Futrelle’s piece and found it equally funny and frightening. A choice quotation: “Even uncovered hair is bad,” as “raw, long hair can excite men”. Raw hair? Bring back the curling irons, girls!

But the raw hatred and sense of entitlement that this piece reveals is like a punch in the stomach. Although I do believe that a minority of men think this way, they are our neighbors and co-workers and relatives, and this ugliness can jump up out of nowhere and slap us in the face-sometimes literally-from men we thought we knew. This is the voice of a threatened patriarchy, and the speakers will do anything to keep their self-created position. They are enormously dangerous.

@Joe – I agree with your general stance. I think the site has a good mission and they get some pretty good people to write for them (I really respect Hugo Schwyzer, for instance). I also think that a very small minority of MRA issues are legitimate but agree with Amanda Marcotte on how they misinterpret the causes and miss good solutions. Most of it, however, is just misogyny — I saw a post the other day about how if women are able to flash people during Mardi Gras, it’s sexist for a cop to yell at a man for *peeing* outside. (In my head: “if the women were expressing breast milk all over the street, maybe it’d be comparable. But that never happens!”) The entire tone is just…so wrong.

The first time I really, truly discovered the MRA movement was while reading an article at work. The outright hatred stunned me. I have always been a feminist and thus very aware of systemic misogyny but to see it said so violently by another human being, in black on a white screen. By another human being with power over others. It was terrifying, to say the least.

An hour later I had to take the bus home from work and as a man around my age sat down next to me I couldn’t help but wonder if he was one of them. That’s when it pissed me off the most.

I like men, many men. I love just as many men as I love women. The fact that these groups make me question this, make me wonder… It’s not fair. I don’t want to end up mistrusting every man I meet.

I agree with Joe that they need to moderate the comments, because the MRA guys will totally fuck up any space where people discuss gender issues in a thoughtful, positive way—ironically, by doing so they’re proving the point of why such sites are necessary in the first place. I’m all for draconian comment moderation, myself. If you let in the trolls, they make the whole place stink of troll-shit.

And I tend to agree with MM that the MRA hateration is the rage of a threatened Patriarchy. Those dudes are dangerous, but the fact that they’re feeling so threatened means they realize how much power and privilege they’re losing and are determined to curse and shout and throw tantrums because of it (I feel the same about white Tea Partiers, too).

WHOA…so when I was assaulted I was the one doing the assaulting? Same goes for when it was just attempted, it was really me trying to rape the dude trying to rape me? Or maybe I’ve just been lurking in dark alleyways waiting to jump the menz without realizing it. I do tend to overpack my schedule, but you’d think I’d remember trying to rape and harass dudes on a weekly basis.

I find MRA’s scary! They do, though, seem to get the idea that We (particularly Het) Men – are emotionally isolated – and lack support in such areas, except from Female Partners (when we have them).

Unfortunately, they totally miss the obvious Fact – that we men have the “deficit” and need to develop our selves – and support for each other.

It’s peculiar that there aren’t enough services for Men who are survivors of abuse and assault. It’s more peculiar that What support exists is nearly all provided by Women – as Men don’t (generally)support domestic violence or rape support work – as volunteers and similar.

We Men – do need to develop many things for men – support for fathers, support related to our health – prostate cancer for example, as well as for male victims/survivors. We don’t, however, need to blame women for our failures to do what we should already be doing!

@Becky: Totally agree. They see it slipping away under their eyes-both MRA extremists and TPers-and it makes them crazy. The same is true for antis. But before they shrivel up and die, they can make life miserable and dangerous for everyone else.

Wow, I think this is the best distillation of the MRA stance I have ever seen, from an MRA, who thinks that he is being reasonable: “When women have the same social, legal and financial benefits, prestigious jobs, money, education, assets, etc. as men, plus women bear the children, won’t that always tilt overall rights, laws, privileges, customs in favor of women?”

In other words, because women bear children, we can’t be allowed to have legal, financial, or social equality because then it would be unfair to men.

@AMensProject – you raise an important issue, the one where men are collectively working together to ensure that men’s health (be it mental, physical, etc) is dealt with in a serious way. It’s important that men are the ones leading the charge on this.

It has taken women, collectively working together, a long time, and even now some issues are not taken as seriously as they should, to get governmental and community support for shelters, public screening programmes, and other supports systems.

I would generally agree about the need to moderate some of the comments at GMP. At the same time, many MRAs don’t seem to realize that their more hateful, violent, conspiracy-minded comments only serve to de-legitimize their movement.

There would almost be something more sinister about them if they pretended to be civil.

I enjoy baiting and tormenting MRA pond scum from time to time. Try it sometime – it’s fun. The MRAs get very, very upset very, very easily. They are illogical/irrational as well as touchy. Naturally, they have no idea of how to debate nor do they understand humor. My feeling is: since they already believe all women are evil bitches, show them a little evil bitchery. Their lives are sad and empty – surely we can all afford this type of charity. Don’t forget to let the repulsive pua (pick-up “artist”) community know that they’re doomed to lonely lives of sexual frustration – and they deserve exactly that. Pua doctrine boils down to the four Fs of dealing with women: Find her, feel her, f*ck her, forget her. Rinse and repeat. They lie a lot about what women like and dislike. If you have a little spare time, set them straight. Why? These are budding George Sodinis. Remember murderer/suicide George Sodini? He was one of them – a 48 yr old plain-looking guy who became furious that 20 year old beauties wouldn’t have sex with him. Who told that freak that he DESERVED gorgeous girls half his age? Most likely it was other puas and mras. These jokers need normal people of both sexes to taunt them without mercy. They need a little extra assistance from the general public. Won’t you please help these idiots today?

Since there is not a single voice of dissent, I assume the comments are moderated, with all opossing opinions being thrashed? If so, this may be pointless to write this, but I’ll try neverthless.

The amount of generalizations thrown around here is staggering. Judging from her comments e.g. about the Duke case, I don’t think more feminism is what the MRM needs if people like Marcotte are representative of it. Futrelle cherry-picks the worst comments, doing his best to discredit whole movement. I may elaborate if anyone wants me to, but to do so now when I still don’t know if it will be stuck in moderation will be a waste of time, and when I read things like “My feeling is: since they already believe all women are evil bitches, show them a little evil bitchery.”, it’s really disheartening.

The thing that a lot of “Nice Guys”TM fail to take into account is how often do you hear about women who escape from abusive relationships start their statement to the police or testimony in court the same way; “He seemed so nice when we first met!”

I sometimes think half the reason these guys become MRAs is because they somehow have it figured that feminism is to blame for them not being able to find a date.

As if a women having the freedom to choose is the reason for them dateless and not their boring and frankly repulsive personalities.